John Boehner's biggest fixation: Benghazi

Boehner and his staff were heavily involved in the lead-up to last week’s Benghazi hearing. | AP Photo

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said on MSNBC this weekend that Republicans have an “obsession” with Benghazi and warned against letting an investigation into the attack eat up all Congress’s attention. Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings, top Democrat on the Oversight panel, has asserted that Issa is using the investigation to “launch unfounded accusations to smear public officials.”

Michael Steel, a spokesman for Boehner, said “From the very beginning, Speaker Boehner has said that the American people deserve the truth about Benghazi, and that Congress has a responsibility to provide effective, vigorous and responsible oversight.”

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“Speaker Boehner has been there through every step of this investigation,” Issa said in a statement Sunday night. “While assembling an effective coalition of committees isn’t easy, it makes stonewalling much more costly for the administration.”

The way the Benghazi probe has unfolded also represents a change from how Republicans handled congressional oversight since taking over the House in 2011.

At the time, oversight was vibrant but also horribly disorganized. Witnesses were being called to Capitol Hill multiple times, before multiple committees, sometimes during the same week. To help tighten the ship, Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) snapped up Issa’s general counsel, Rob Borden, to coordinate investigations across the Capitol.

House Republicans will continue to push on Benghazi, the implementation of Obamacare and claims that the IRS targeted conservative nonprofit groups for special review, an issue that has infuriated the right and already embarrassed the White House.

Boehner and his staff were heavily involved in the lead-up to last week’s Benghazi hearing.

On Nov. 16 — just 10 days after Mitt Romney’s defeat — Boehner coordinated a classified briefing from the State Department, the Department of Defense and FBI for top GOP lawmakers like Rogers, Armed Services Committee Chairman Buck McKeon of California, Appropriations Committee Chairman Hal Rogers of Kentucky, and Reps. Lamar Smith and Kay Granger of Texas, and Bill Young and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen of Florida.

At that point, Boehner already knew Issa was maneuvering to press forward on Benghazi. On Sept. 29, the California Republican told the speaker he was in touch with sources who expressed interest in acting as whistleblowers. Issa held his first Benghazi hearing on Oct. 10, just weeks before Election Day, earning widespread Democratic complaints.

And when Clinton called Boehner on Dec. 3 to discuss aid to the Palestinian Authority, the speaker said the State Department would need to come to the Hill soon to brief lawmakers about the attack. Two days later, Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and other top administration officials briefed the whole House.

On March 21, Republican lawmakers from the House and Senate gathered in the speaker’s conference room to talk about next steps on Benghazi. They included Cantor, Rogers, Royce, Issa and Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte of Virginia.